


683

by hingabee



Category: Metal Gear
Genre: Implied/Referenced Torture, Introspection, Memories, Other, Prisoner of War, Rape/Non-con Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-18
Updated: 2020-08-18
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:07:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25971844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hingabee/pseuds/hingabee
Summary: It had taken exactly six hundred and eighty-three days for him to realise that nobody was going to come for him.
Relationships: Liquid Snake/Psycho Mantis
Comments: 4
Kudos: 9
Collections: Metal Gear Solid - Summer Games -2020





	683

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [the prisoner](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/668959) by koi_fin. 



> a submission for the mgs summergames! fic based on [this beautiful painting by koi_fin on twitter](https://twitter.com/koi_fin/status/1264258634936209409)!   
> please mind the warnings!

It was a cold night.

Liquid woke with a start from a vaguely unpleasant dream – one of many – and slowly blinked, eyes sticky and still adjusting to the darkness.

He was alone.

That of course, was a constant nowadays (except when it wasn’t) and Liquid wasn’t particularly bothered by it anymore, actually going so far as to prefer the solitude over… company.

His emaciated body ached as he pushed himself up against the wall by the shoulders into a sitting position, hands bound behind his back and wrists sore and bloody from the rope. Dirt clung to his skin, seeped deep into cuts and wounds that pulsated, oozing foul fluids that mixed with the dried blood on the grimy floor.

They had taken his uniform right away, sometimes thrown him an old shirt, a dirty rag to cover himself with or to wipe off vomit or blood or worse. 

Despite his unruly nature Liquid had always been quite good with numbers, even as a stubborn child during the sporadic classes at Mother Base he had excelled at any mathematics subjects, not without a petty childish pride gleaming in his eyes. 

Now ever since the day he had gotten shot down he had counted the days, the only indication of the day-night cycle a small barred window that let in dirty sunlight and the occasional rain into the little stuffy hole they kept him in. 

And it had taken exactly six hundred and eighty-three days for him to realise that nobody was going to come for him, to take him into their arms and carry him away from all this pain and humiliation. 

Liquid wasn’t just lost, missing in action – he was dead.

Sure, he fantasised about it at first. The faces of his comrades from his squadron – most of them posh little boys as new recruits that cried themselves to sleep every night of training, though only a surprisingly small amount of them gave up. 

He had grown to care for them – superficially yes, but there was a strong sense of kinship and pride he hadn’t felt since his childhood in Angola. Now more than ever he had been the leading type, guiding his fellow soldiers along with discipline and charm – his involvement with the SIS unbeknownst to them. 

There were few who could have survived, most of the boys had been captured alongside with him but had been too soft and pliable for the rough hands of their Iraqi captors. Had abandoned him only mere weeks into his captivity. 

Soon he had forgotten all about them, his life before this a vague flash of colours and impressions. 

Then there was the blonde woman who he had met only a handful of times during his time at Mother Base, who called himself his mother and carried herself in a way that left him deeply uncomfortable and ashamed. He hadn’t needed a mother back then. 

Maybe he did now, though.

The door to his cell creaked as a drunken fat man stumbled in, a slimy grin plastered on his face as he approached Liquid with a stick.

In his time here he had quickly learned that the wooden sticks were way worse than the guns they threatened him with or the knives they liked to use to cut and slice at his flesh. The dull pain of broken bones crushed against the ground as the stepped on him and beat the stick over his head until he passed out had become as familiar as–

The man slurred the usual derogatory names at him, then beckoned two others to follow him into the cell all while chortling out a pig-like laughter intermingled by coughs.

Naked as he was Liquid pushed himself closer against the wall in anticipation of what was to come, almost subconsciously pressing his legs together tightly as if his body knew just as well. 

He was called forward, ordered to get up and present himself – Liquid just laughed at that and spat into the dirt, he hadn’t been able to stand for quite some time now, legs too weak and bruised, bones too broken. 

The stick crashed down against the side of his face with a crunch and he dropped down into the dirt.   
This time it didn’t take them long to get to the main attraction, they pulled him to his knees by his bound hands, the youngest of the men having to hold him up to grant his comrades better access.

Liquid shut down the second a warm and greasy hand pushed between his legs while thick fingers pressed into his mouth. 

Because after all there was Mantis, childish and aloof Mantis who had betrayed him just like all the others who had promised to devote themselves to his cause. 

Before he had firmly believed that somehow his friend would learn about his fate through the twisted grapevine of the KGB, to come to his aid and exercise the raw power he had only ever willingly shared with Liquid. But that had been just another pathetic fantasy, a pipe dream.

Mantis never came, had abandoned Liquid – and who could blame him? He was powerful and smart with a promising future ahead of him, had grown up so much in the years they spent together, no longer an extension of Eli but a perfect little décalcomanie of their shared desires. 

Somehow saying goodbye hadn’t been hard at all. Liquid, Eli back then, had known that his friend would be just fine.

But now, as he was violated, tortured, taken apart and rearranged every single day – so isolated from the world he had sworn revenge on all he felt was a dull longing, a barely existent hint of emotion. 

The only thing Mantis was useful for now was granting him a distraction, release, a feigned comfort based on how Liquid had constructed the shining image of him in their time apart. Sweet and clumsy memories of many firsts, so much uncertainty. 

And sometimes Liquid felt disgusted at his own thoughts, not for being defiled, but for defiling the memory of the only person that had ever gotten close enough to him to truly understand.


End file.
